Initial tests revealed that the stains are in fact semen.(2)
Based on that result, the OIC asked the President for a blood
sample.(3) After requesting and being given assurances that the
OIC had an evidentiary basis for making the request, the
President agreed.(4) In the White House Map Room on August 3,
1998, the White House Physician drew a vial of blood from the
President in the presence of an FBI agent and an OIC attorney.(5)
By conducting the two standard DNA comparison tests, the FBI
Laboratory concluded that the President was the source of the DNA
obtained from the dress.(6) According to the more sensitive RFLP
test, the genetic markers on the semen, which match the
President's DNA, are characteristic of one out of 7.87 trillion
Caucasians.(7)

In addition to the dress, Ms. Lewinsky provided what she
said were answering machine tapes containing brief messages from
the President, as well as several gifts that the President had
given her.

In the evaluation of experienced prosecutors and
investigators, Ms. Lewinsky has provided truthful information.
She has not falsely inculpated the President. Harming him, she
has testified, is "the last thing in the world I want to do."(11)

Moreover, the OIC's immunity and cooperation agreement with
Ms. Lewinsky includes safeguards crafted to ensure that she tells
the truth. Court-ordered immunity and written immunity
agreements often provide that the witness can be prosecuted only
for false statements made during the period of cooperation, and
not for the underlying offense. The OIC's agreement goes
further, providing that Ms. Lewinsky will lose her immunity
altogether if the government can prove to a federal district
judge -- by a preponderance of the evidence, not the higher
standard of beyond a reasonable doubt -- that she lied.
Moreover, the agreement provides that, in the course of such a
prosecution, the United States could introduce into evidence the
statements made by Ms. Lewinsky during her cooperation. Since
Ms. Lewinsky acknowledged in her proffer interview and in
debriefings that she violated the law, she has a strong incentive
to tell the truth: If she did not, it would be relatively
straightforward to void the immunity agreement and prosecute her,
using her own admissions against her.

Some of Ms. Lewinsky's statements about the relationship
were contemporaneously memorialized. These include deleted email
recovered from her home computer and her Pentagon computer, email
messages retained by two of the recipients, tape recordings of
some of Ms. Lewinsky's conversations with Ms. Tripp, and notes
taken by Ms. Tripp during some of their conversations. The Tripp
notes, which have been extensively corroborated, refer
specifically to places, dates, and times of physical contacts
between the President and Ms. Lewinsky.(13)

Everyone in whom Ms. Lewinsky confided in detail believed
she was telling the truth about her relationship with the
President. Ms. Lewinsky told her psychologist, Dr. Irene
Kassorla, about the affair shortly after it began. Thereafter,
she related details of sexual encounters soon after they occurred
(sometimes calling from her White House office).(14) Ms. Lewinsky
showed no indications of delusional thinking, according to Dr.
Kassorla, and Dr. Kassorla had no doubts whatsoever about the
truth of what Ms. Lewinsky told her.(15) Ms. Lewinsky's friend
Catherine Allday Davis testified that she believed Ms. Lewinsky's
accounts of the sexual relationship with the President because "I
trusted in the way she had confided in me on other things in her
life. . . . I just trusted the relationship, so I trusted
her."(16) Dale Young, a friend in whom Ms. Lewinsky confided
starting in mid-1996, testified:

[I]f she was going to lie to me, she would have said to me,
"Oh, he calls me all the time. He does wonderful things.
He can't wait to see me." . . . [S]he would have
embellished the story. You know, she wouldn't be telling
me, "He told me he'd call me, I waited home all weekend and
I didn't do anything and he didn't call and then he didn't
call for two weeks."(17)

During the deposition, the President's attorney, Robert
Bennett, sought to limit questioning about Ms. Lewinsky. Mr.
Bennett told Judge Susan Webber Wright that Ms. Lewinsky had
executed "an affidavit which [Ms. Jones's lawyers] are in
possession of saying that there is absolutely no sex of any kind
in any manner, shape or form, with President Clinton." In a
subsequent colloquy with Judge Wright, Mr. Bennett declared that
as a result of "preparation of [President Clinton] for this
deposition, the witness is fully aware of Ms. Lewinsky's
affidavit."(21) The President did not dispute his legal
representative's assertion that the President and Ms. Lewinsky
had had "absolutely no sex of any kind in any manner, shape or
form," nor did he dispute the implication that Ms. Lewinsky's
affidavit, in denying "a sexual relationship," meant that there
was "absolutely no sex of any kind in any manner, shape or form."
In subsequent questioning by his attorney, President Clinton
testified under oath that Ms. Lewinsky's affidavit was
"absolutely true."(22)

The President refused to answer questions about the precise
nature of his intimate contacts with Ms. Lewinsky, but he did
explain his earlier denials.(26) As to his denial in the Jones
deposition that he and Ms. Lewinsky had had a "sexual
relationship," the President maintained that there can be no
sexual relationship without sexual intercourse, regardless of
what other sexual activities may transpire. He stated that "most
ordinary Americans" would embrace this distinction.(27)

The President also maintained that none of his sexual
contacts with Ms. Lewinsky constituted "sexual relations" within
a specific definition used in the Jones deposition.(28) Under that
definition:

[A] person engages in "sexual relations" when the person
knowingly engages in or causes -- (1) contact with the
genitalia, anus, groin, breast, inner thigh, or buttocks of
any person with an intent to arouse or gratify the sexual
desire of any person . . . . "Contact" means intentional
touching, either directly or through clothing.(29)

According to what the President testified was his understanding,
this definition "covers contact by the person being deposed with
the enumerated areas, if the contact is done with an intent to
arouse or gratify," but it does not cover oral sex performed on
the person being deposed.(30) He testified:

[I]f the deponent is the person who has oral sex performed
on him, then the contact is with -- not with anything on
that list, but with the lips of another person. It seems to
be self-evident that that's what it is. . . . Let me remind
you, sir, I read this carefully.(31)

In the President's view, "any person, reasonable person" would
recognize that oral sex performed on the deponent falls outside
the definition.(32)

If Ms. Lewinsky performed oral sex on the President, then --
under this interpretation -- she engaged in sexual relations but
he did not. The President refused to answer whether Ms. Lewinsky
in fact had performed oral sex on him.(33) He did testify that
direct contact with Ms. Lewinsky's breasts or genitalia would
fall within the definition, and he denied having had any such
contact.(34)

Ms. Lewinsky testified that her physical relationship with
the President included oral sex but not sexual intercourse.(38)
According to Ms. Lewinsky, she performed oral sex on the
President; he never performed oral sex on her.(39) Initially,
according to Ms. Lewinsky, the President would not let her
perform oral sex to completion. In Ms. Lewinsky's understanding,
his refusal was related to "trust and not knowing me well
enough."(40) During their last two sexual encounters, both in
1997, he did ejaculate.(41)

According to Ms. Lewinsky, she performed oral sex on the
President on nine occasions. On all nine of those occasions, the
President fondled and kissed her bare breasts. He touched her
genitals, both through her underwear and directly, bringing her
to orgasm on two occasions. On one occasion, the President
inserted a cigar into her vagina. On another occasion, she and
the President had brief genital-to-genital contact.(42)

Whereas the President testified that "what began as a
friendship came to include [intimate contact]," Ms. Lewinsky
explained that the relationship moved in the opposite direction:
"[T]he emotional and friendship aspects . . . developed after the
beginning of our sexual relationship."(43)

Ms. Lewinsky told confidants of the emotional underpinnings
of the relationship as it evolved. According to her mother,
Marcia Lewis, the President once told Ms. Lewinsky that she "had
been hurt a lot or something by different men and that he would
be her friend or he would help her, not hurt her."(52) According
to Ms. Lewinsky's friend Neysa Erbland, President Clinton once
confided in Ms. Lewinsky that he was uncertain whether he would
remain married after he left the White House. He said in
essence, "[W]ho knows what will happen four years from now when I
am out of office?" Ms. Lewinsky thought, according to Ms.
Erbland, that "maybe she will be his wife."(53)

The longer conversations often occurred after their sexual
contact. Ms. Lewinsky testified: "[W]hen I was working there
[at the White House] . . . we'd start in the back [in or near the
private study] and we'd talk and that was where we were
physically intimate, and we'd usually end up, kind of the pillow
talk of it, I guess, . . . sitting in the Oval Office . . . ."(56)
During several meetings when they were not sexually intimate,
they talked in the Oval Office or in the area of the study.(57)

Along with face-to-face meetings, according to Ms. Lewinsky,
she spoke on the telephone with the President approximately 50
times, often after 10 p.m. and sometimes well after midnight.(58)
The President placed the calls himself or, during working hours,
had his secretary, Betty Currie, do so; Ms. Lewinsky could not
telephone him directly, though she sometimes reached him through
Ms. Currie.(59) Ms. Lewinsky testified: "[W]e spent hours on the
phone talking."(60) Their telephone conversations were "[s]imilar
to what we discussed in person, just how we were doing. A lot of
discussions about my job, when I was trying to come back to the
White House and then once I decided to move to New York. . . .
We talked about everything under the sun."(61) On 10 to 15
occasions, she and the President had phone sex.(62) After phone
sex late one night, the President fell asleep mid-conversation.(63)

On four occasions, the President left very brief messages on
Ms. Lewinsky's answering machine, though he told her that he did
not like doing so because (in her recollection) he "felt it was a
little unsafe."(64) She saved his messages and played the tapes
for several confidants, who said they believed that the voice was
the President's.(65)

By phone and in person, according to Ms. Lewinsky, she and
the President sometimes had arguments. On a number of occasions
in 1997, she complained that he had not brought her back from the
Pentagon to work in the White House, as he had promised to do
after the election.(66) In a face-to-face meeting on July 4, 1997,
the President reprimanded her for a letter she had sent him that
obliquely threatened to disclose their relationship.(67) During an
argument on December 6, 1997, according to Ms. Lewinsky, the
President said that "he had never been treated as poorly by
anyone else as I treated him," and added that "he spent more time
with me than anyone else in the world, aside from his family,
friends and staff, which I don't know exactly which category that
put me in."(68)

Testifying before the grand jury, the President confirmed
that he and Ms. Lewinsky had had personal conversations, and he
acknowledged that their telephone conversations sometimes
included "inappropriate sexual banter."(69) The President said
that Ms. Lewinsky told him about "her personal life," "her
upbringing," and "her job ambitions."(70) After terminating their
intimate relationship in 1997, he said, he tried "to be a friend
to Ms. Lewinsky, to be a counselor to her, to give her good
advice, and to help her."(71)

Ms. Lewinsky and the President exchanged numerous gifts. By
her estimate, she gave him about 30 items, and he gave her about
18.(72) Ms. Lewinsky's first gift to him was a matted poem given
by her and other White House interns to commemorate "National
Boss Day," October 24, 1995.(73) This was the only item reflected
in White House records that Ms. Lewinsky gave the President
before (in her account) the sexual relationship began, and the
only item that he sent to the archives instead of keeping.(74) On
November 20 -- five days after the intimate relationship began,
according to Ms. Lewinsky -- she gave him a necktie, which he
chose to keep rather than send to the archives.(75) According to
Ms. Lewinsky, the President telephoned the night she gave him the
tie, then sent her a photo of himself wearing it.(76) The tie was
logged pursuant to White House procedures for gifts to the
President.(77)

In a draft note to the President in December 1997, Ms.
Lewinsky wrote that she was "very particular about presents and
could never give them to anyone else -- they were all bought with
you in mind."(78) Many of the 30 or so gifts that she gave the
President reflected his interests in history, antiques, cigars,
and frogs. Ms. Lewinsky gave him, among other things, six
neckties, an antique paperweight showing the White House, a
silver tabletop holder for cigars or cigarettes, a pair of
sunglasses, a casual shirt, a mug emblazoned "Santa Monica," a
frog figurine, a letter opener depicting a frog, several novels,
a humorous book of quotations, and several antique books.(79) He
gave her, among other things, a hat pin, two brooches, a blanket,
a marble bear figurine, and a special edition of Walt Whitman's
Leaves of Grass.(80)

Ms. Lewinsky construed it as a sign of affection when the
President wore a necktie or other item of clothing she had given
him. She testified: "I used to say to him that 'I like it when
you wear my ties because then I know I'm close to your heart.'
So -- literally and figuratively."(81) The President was aware of
her reaction, according to Ms. Lewinsky, and he would sometimes
wear one of the items to reassure her -- occasionally on the day
they were scheduled to meet or the day after they had met in
person or talked by telephone.(82) The President would sometimes
say to her, "Did you see I wore your tie the other day?"(83)

In his grand jury testimony, the President acknowledged that
he had exchanged a number of gifts with Ms. Lewinsky. After
their intimate relationship ended in 1997, he testified, "[S]he
continued to give me gifts. And I felt that it was a right thing
to do to give her gifts back."(84)

Testifying before the grand jury, the President acknowledged
having received cards and notes from Ms. Lewinsky that were
"somewhat intimate" and "quite affectionate," even after the
intimate relationship ended.(88)

In his grand jury testimony, the President confirmed his
efforts to keep their liaisons secret.(94) He said he did not want
the facts of their relationship to be disclosed "in any context,"
and added: "I certainly didn't want this to come out, if I could
help it. And I was concerned about that. I was embarrassed
about it. I knew it was wrong."(95) Asked if he wanted to avoid
having the facts come out through Ms. Lewinsky's testimony in
Jones, he said: "Well, I did not want her to have to testify and
go through that. And, of course, I didn't want her to do that,
of course not."(96)

For her visits to see the President, according to Ms.
Lewinsky, "[T]here was always some sort of a cover."(97) When
visiting the President while she worked at the White House, she
generally planned to tell anyone who asked (including Secret
Service officers and agents) that she was delivering papers to
the President.(98) Ms. Lewinsky explained that this artifice may
have originated when "I got there kind of saying, 'Oh, gee, here
are your letters,' wink, wink, wink, and him saying, 'Okay,
that's good.'"(99) To back up her stories, she generally carried a
folder on these visits.(100) (In truth, according to Ms. Lewinsky,
her job never required her to deliver papers to the President.(101))
On a few occasions during her White House employment, Ms.
Lewinsky and the President arranged to bump into each other in
the hallway; he then would invite her to accompany him to the
Oval Office.(102) Later, after she left the White House and started
working at the Pentagon, Ms. Lewinsky relied on Ms. Currie to
arrange times when she could see the President. The cover story
for those visits was that Ms. Lewinsky was coming to see Ms.
Currie, not the President.(103)

While the President did not expressly instruct her to lie,
according to Ms. Lewinsky, he did suggest misleading cover
stories.(104) And, when she assured him that she planned to lie
about the relationship, he responded approvingly. On the
frequent occasions when Ms. Lewinsky promised that she would
"always deny" the relationship and "always protect him," for
example, the President responded, in her recollection, "'That's
good,' or -- something affirmative. . . . [N]ot -- 'Don't deny
it.'"(105)

Once she was named as a possible witness in the Jones case,
according to Ms. Lewinsky, the President reminded her of the
cover stories. After telling her that she was a potential
witness, the President suggested that, if she were subpoenaed,
she could file an affidavit to avoid being deposed. He also told
her she could say that, when working at the White House, she had
sometimes delivered letters to him, and, after leaving her White
House job, she had sometimes returned to visit Ms. Currie.(106)
(The President's own testimony in the Jones case mirrors the
recommendations he made to Ms. Lewinsky for her testimony. In
his deposition, the President testified that he saw Ms. Lewinsky
"on two or three occasions" during the November 1995 government
furlough, "one or two other times when she brought some documents
to me," and "sometime before Christmas" when Ms. Lewinsky "came
by to see Betty."(107))

In his grand jury testimony, the President acknowledged that
he and Ms. Lewinsky "might have talked about what to do in a
nonlegal context" to hide their relationship, and that he "might
well have said" that Ms. Lewinsky should tell people that she was
bringing letters to him or coming to visit Ms. Currie.(108) But he
also stated that "I never asked Ms. Lewinsky to lie."(109)

He had told me . . . that he was usually around on the
weekends and that it was okay to come see him on the
weekends. So he would call and we would arrange either to
bump into each other in the hall or that I would bring
papers to the office.(111)

From some of the President's comments, Ms. Lewinsky gathered that
she should try to avoid being seen by several White House
employees, including Nancy Hernreich, Deputy Assistant to the
President and Director of Oval Office Operations, and Stephen
Goodin, the President's personal aide.(112)

Out of concern about being seen, the sexual encounters most
often occurred in the windowless hallway outside the study.(113)
According to Ms. Lewinsky, the President was concerned that the
two of them might be spotted through a White House window. When
they were in the study together in the evenings, he sometimes
turned out the light.(114) Once, when she spotted a gardener
outside the study window, they left the room.(115) Ms. Lewinsky
testified that, on December 28, 1997, "when I was getting my
Christmas kiss" in the doorway to the study, the President was
"looking out the window with his eyes wide open while he was
kissing me and then I got mad because it wasn't very romantic."
He responded, "Well, I was just looking to see to make sure no
one was out there."(116)

Fear of discovery constrained their sexual encounters in
several respects, according to Ms. Lewinsky. The President
ordinarily kept the door between the private hallway and the Oval
Office several inches ajar during their encounters, both so that
he could hear if anyone approached and so that anyone who did
approach would be less likely to suspect impropriety.(117) During
their sexual encounters, Ms. Lewinsky testified, "[W]e were both
aware of the volume and sometimes . . . I bit my hand -- so that
I wouldn't make any noise."(118) On one occasion, according to Ms.
Lewinsky, the President put his hand over her mouth during a
sexual encounter to keep her quiet.(119) Concerned that they might
be interrupted abruptly, according to Ms. Lewinsky, the two of
them never fully undressed.(120)

While noting that "the door to the hallway was always
somewhat open," the President testified that he did try to keep
the intimate relationship secret: "I did what people do when
they do the wrong thing. I tried to do it where nobody else was
looking at it."(121)

She said that the President made this point to her in their last
conversation, on January 5, 1998, in reference to what she
characterized as "[a]n embarrassing mushy note" she had sent
him.(123) In addition, according to Ms. Lewinsky, the President
expressed concerns about official records that could establish
aspects of their relationship. She said that on two occasions
she asked the President if she could go upstairs to the Residence
with him. No, he said, because a record is kept of everyone who
accompanies him there.(124)

The President testified before the grand jury: "I remember
telling her she should be careful what she wrote, because a lot
of it was clearly inappropriate and would be embarrassing if
somebody else read it."(125)

In another recorded conversation, Ms. Lewinsky said she was
especially comforted by the fact that the President, like her,
would be swearing under oath that "nothing happened."(130) She
said:

[T]o tell you the truth, I'm not concerned all that much
anymore because I know I'm not going to get in trouble. I
will not get in trouble because you know what? The story
I've signed under -- under oath is what someone else is
saying under oath.(131)